Data communication networks are capable of communicating various types of information between two or more devices coupled to the network. In certain situations, a device may transmit data to a destination by utilizing multiple communication links simultaneously. This is often referred to as multilink communication. For example, a remote data source may transmit data to a remote access unit across multiple communication links simultaneously, in which each communication link is coupled between the remote access unit and the remote data source. By using multiple communication links, the data can be transmitted faster than with a single communication link. Additionally, when multiple communication links are used, a single slow link has less affect on the overall data throughput because other communication links with better throughput can handle a greater portion of the data.
In existing systems, the multiple communication links are coupled between a single remote access unit and the remote data source. If the single remote access unit is approaching its data handling capacity, then the throughput on all of the multiple communication links may be reduced due to the limitations of the remote access unit. To avoid this problem, it is desirable to establish communication links between the remote data source and two or more remote access units. In this type of configuration, if one of the remote access units is approaching its data handling capacity, the transmission of data can be shifted to another remote access unit (using another communication link) having greater available resources. However, in existing systems, when data is transmitted to two or more remote access units, the multiple remote access units do not have any mechanism for reassembling the received data into its original form. Although one of the remote access units may be designated as the unit responsible for reassembling the data, existing systems do not have the ability to locate that designated unit or to transmit data from one remote access unit to another.
It is therefore desirable to provide a system capable of establishing and identifying bundle heads that are responsible for reassembling data received by multiple remote access units across multiple communication links.